1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a cigarette ejecting system to be suitably used with a cigarette packaging apparatus. More particularly, it relates to a cigarette ejecting system to be incorporated in a cigarette packaging apparatus in which the system is realized by arranging transferring drums between the respective aligning drums of the apparatus for aligning a given number of cigarettes in rows and the piling drum for piling rows of cigarettes into layers in an orderly and staggered manner in the cigarette packaging apparatus so that the system is capable of ejecting the cigarettes on any of the transferring drums of the apparatus by applying compressed air whenever one or more than one defective cigarettes are detected in the row of cigarettes on any of the transferring drums or the row of cigarettes on the transferring drum contains an insufficient number of cigarettes.
2. Description of the Related Art
A cigarette packaging apparatus normally comprises a piling machine that takes out a predetermined number of cigarettes, e.g., twenty cigarettes, out of a storage facility such as a hopper where cigarettes are randomly stored and piles them to three layers of seven, six and seven in an orderly and staggered manner, a wrapping machine that wraps them with a sheet of aluminum foil or a wrapping paper and a sealing machine that seals the wrapped package of cigarettes by an appropriate means (a sealing sheet). These machines are mutually connected as integral components of a cigarette packaging apparatus so that cigarettes fed to the hopper are discharged from the packaging apparatus in the form of packaged final products.
The piling machine is provided with a number of cigarette feed channels that correspond to the number of cigarettes to be packed together in a package (e.g., twenty channels) and the cigarettes in the hopper are aligned in the channels and gradually fed to the machine. The piling machine takes up a cigarette from each channel at a time by means of a receiving drum. The cigarettes held by the respective drums are then transferred to three aligning drums, which carry respectively seven, six and seven aligned cigarettes for three layers of cigarettes. The cigarettes on the aligning drums are thereafter moved to a piling drum that receives the three different rows of cigarettes from the respective aligning drums to form on it three layers of cigarettes arranged in an orderly and staggered manner for a package of twenty cigarettes. Finally, the piled cigarettes are moved to the wrapping machine, where they are wrapped and sealed.
However, there may arise cases where defective cigarettes that may be devoid of a filter are fed to the aligning drums of the piling machine or where some of the cigarettes being fed are damaged while moving, leading to an insufficient number of flawless cigarettes arranged on one or more than one of the aligning drums. Packages of cigarettes that contain such defective cigarettes are, by definition, defective packages of cigarettes.
Conventionally, defective cigarettes are detected by means of a detector and ejected out of the transfer line somewhere in the wrapping machine by an appropriate means such as a pusher before they are packaged. However, any known means for ejecting defective cigarettes such as a pusher comprises a reciprocating mechanism and inevitably involves reciprocal movements, meaning that such a pusher or a similar means for ejecting defective cigarettes does not and cannot meet the requirement of high speed operation if an advanced cigarette packaging apparatus of recent development is used and inevitably imposes a speed limit to the operation of the apparatus.
Additionally, with a conventional cigarette packaging apparatus, defective cigarettes are ejected after having been wrapped by wrapping paper or foil and the tobacco of the defective cigarettes are separated from the wrapping paper and the casing for reuse, entailing cumbersome processes for the separation of tobacco and wrapping paper.